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<title>Jellyfish by QueenOfRohirrim</title>
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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/23909677">Jellyfish</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/QueenOfRohirrim/pseuds/QueenOfRohirrim'>QueenOfRohirrim</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>The Witcher (TV), Wiedźmin | The Witcher - All Media Types</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Bathing/Washing, Domestic Fluff, F/M, Fluff, Loving Marriage, Scars</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-04-29</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-04-29</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-02 19:14:18</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,276</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/23909677</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/QueenOfRohirrim/pseuds/QueenOfRohirrim</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>There’s a scar on her husband’s knee that he’s never talked about before.</p><p>Calanthe is determined to get the story out of him.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Calanthe Fiona Riannon/Eist Tuirseach</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>43</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Jellyfish</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“Darling?” Calanthe inquired, her voice soft and relaxed as she rested against her husband in the warm water, the bare skin of her back pressed against his front while she drug the tips of her fingers over a long, winding scar above his knee.</p><p>“Hm?” Eist hummed, paying careful attention to his current task of washing the Queen’s lovely long hair. The sweet and sharp scent of the mint oils he’d used filled the steamy air around the bath. Everything smelled so strongly of her. Of them. It was beyond wonderful.</p><p>“You’ve never told me about this one.” The Lioness purred, closing her eyes with a satisfied smile as her husband tenderly massaged the cooling oil into her scalp. Her fingers still stroked the mysterious scar. She’d always wondered about it but he’d never given away the tale.</p><p>“About what, my dearest?” The king raised a brow, confused and slightly pulled from sense by the intimacy of the moment.</p><p>Though, once he realized what exactly she was touching, his mind hurried to hunt down a proper excuse.</p><p>“You want to hear about scars again?” He asked his wife, throwing on his most charming smirk. “I’ve got better ones than that. See what others you can find.”</p><p>Calanthe rolled her eyes fondly, letting slip a small, adoring smile. “I’ve heard plenty of the others.” She insisted, slowly moving one hand back to tease against a spot on his thigh. “The assassin you so bravely stopped in your brother’s court...” She hummed, bringing her other hand up to rest against his chin. “A brawl with the pirate who threatened your sister’s honor...”</p><p>“Your memory is an absolute wonder, my love.” Eist breathed softly, enjoying every teasing touch she indulged him with.</p><p>“Oh, I forget nothing.” The Queen boasted. “There’s a spot on your back from the jaws of an eel. A crude thunder bolt shaped into your shoulder, courtesy of a mutinous crewman...”</p><p>“I’m quite proud of that one.” Her husband grinned.</p><p>“You’ve never told me of this beauty, Eist.” Calanthe sighed, returning the conversation, and the wonderful tips of her fingers, to the subject he’d been hoping to steer her away from. “Why not?”</p><p>Again, he went for a vague excuse. “Not a terribly interesting story, I’m afraid.” </p><p>She must have caught a hint of wavering nerve in his voice. Calanthe was always good at that.</p><p>“If it’s so mundane, I’m sure there wouldn’t be any reason to keep it to yourself.” She tilted her head back, looking up at him with knowing eyes. “Come now, love. Do bore me with the tale.”</p><p>“Her Majesty would be far more interested in the knick a pick pocket left on my neck.” Eist tried once more to dissuade his wife.</p><p>It didn’t work.</p><p>“Her majesty is commanding you now, Eist Tuirseach.” Calanthe hummed triumphantly, never so certain of a victory as she was then. “You will obey her or there will be consequences.”</p><p>“Her majesty is a wicked woman.” Eist hummed with a small smile at the mock threat, his will to refuse his wife defeated. “It was a jellyfish.” </p><p>Calanthe’s eyes widened and retreated to the mark beneath her fingers, holding it in her gaze for a long while before she looked back up at her husband, quite obviously fighting a laugh.</p><p>“You see?” Eist huffed at her. “I knew this is what you’d do.”</p><p>“Oh you can’t be serious!” Calanthe began to giggle at him. “A jellyfish? Truly?”</p><p>“Truly. Now find a better scar to ask me about. I’d like to recover my reputation.” </p><p>“Absolutely not!” Calanthe refused, turning over so that she was lying against her husband face to face, her breasts pressed to his front now as she looked him straight in the eye. “I wanted a story. You can’t just leave it at that.”</p><p>“You know, consequences don’t sound so bad.” The King decided. “I think I’ll keep the details to myself.”</p><p>“Eist...” </p><p>There it was. That bloody pleading tone. Eist was wrapped around his wife’s finger anyway, but that wanting in her voice...</p><p>“Alright, alright.” The King agreed. “Bloody relentless, you are...It happened when I was a boy. I was swimming in the shallows not too far from the beach. My sister and brother were with me and every now and again we’d venture out just a little deeper. Of course, at some point mother decided we’d swam out too far for her liking.”</p><p>“I take it you weren’t nearly as keen to obey then?” Calanthe smiled, resting her chin against her husband’s chest, the top of her head lying against his face.</p><p>“I was not.” Eist confirmed. “Unfortunately for me, I was also a bit prone to injury as a child. Not many of our family outings ended on a happy note.”</p><p>“Your poor mother.” Calanthe snorted.</p><p>“She had a few clever tricks up her sleeve to protect me from myself.” Eist recalled with a fond smile. “This time she warned me that if I ventured too far from the shore, I’d come too close to a kelp garden.”</p><p>“A kelp garden?” The Lioness hummed, raising a brow. “What is that exactly?”</p><p>“Just what it sounds like. A garden of kelp. Mother convinced all three of us that they were kept by sea hags that made their homes in the plants they grew...A sea hag is much like a mermaid, but with horrid faces and even worse tempers.”</p><p>“Did you believe her?” Calanthe inquired, bringing one hand up to stroke at her husband’s bicep. He liked that, and she was eager to keep him talking.</p><p>“I was skeptical at first.” Eist admitted. “My sister believed it all, of course, but Bran was just worried he’d be punished for not listening. I wasn’t so scared of a swat, so I decided to see for myself if these kelp gardens existed.”</p><p>“And?” Calanthe smirked, sensing a humorous end to the tale.</p><p>“I swam out further, tangled my leg in a jellyfish’s stingers and that was that.” Eist concluded, sighing when his wife began to laugh again. “It was not at all funny at the time, I assure you.”</p><p>“Oh, my sweet sweet lovely dear, I’m sorry.” Calanthe consoled him, smiling still as she moved upward to kiss his forehead, his cheek, and then his mouth. “It’s just not at all what I was expecting to hear.”</p><p>“So long as you don’t tell anyone...” Eist teased her as he was kissed. “I suppose all is forgiven.”</p><p>“I would never.” Calanthe promised, wrapping her arms around his shoulders and pressing her lips once more against his cheek. “But do tell me this, darling. How long did you believe that it was the sea hag who stung you?”</p><p>“Awhile.” Eist confessed. “And that is all I am willing to divulge.”</p><p>Calanthe let another cackle escape her as she hugged her husband tightly. “Such a good boy...” She crooned to him. “Letting me in on all of his secrets...”</p><p>“I think I deserve a reward.” The King replied, letting one hand venture down below his wife’s waist.</p><p>She grabbed it before he could reach what he wanted. “Not yet.” She shook her head. “I didn’t wash your hair yet.”</p><p>“That can wait, can it not?” He groaned at her.</p><p>“No, it can’t.” The Lioness smirked, grabbing the bottle of minty oil up from the edge of the bath and pouring what remained of it over her husband’s head. “You’ll just have to be patient.”</p><p>“Wicked woman.”</p><p>“Speak sweetly to me, my heart...” Calanthe advised, her smile widening as she began to run her hands slowly through handsome black hair. “Otherwise, I’ll make you wait even longer.”</p>
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